Nollywood leading actress Funke Akindele spoke candidly for the first time about her failed marriage with Kehinde Oloyede, in an interview with E-47.
Excerpts:
“I was abused emotionally and verbally. Really, I felt we could work things out when the trouble started two months after the marriage, but I made up my mind and shut the door of the marriage at him when the trouble was coming to me too much.
I stooped to conquer him; buried my fame and name to make him my husband, but it did not work. At a point in time, I asked if it’s not the same man that was all over me before we married. He nearly got me off my career. He called me severally; I did not pick his calls but when he realized my silence was tormenting him, he took to Facebook. It’s alright. Ask him when did he come to my house last? He left me here in my rented apartment with nothing and he will just dash in and dash out. He gets abusive, caustic anytime we have a misunderstanding and often told me to my face, he’s going to his wife in Oshodi.”
At Oshodi, she said, she received a warm welcome from the wife, Fadekemi, but constant humiliation from Kehinde.
“She was really loved by the kids at home; she enjoyed taking them out to eateries and stores. Sometimes, they spent the weekend with her and she followed them to school. The children will surely miss her,” our source, close to the family, said. Now that the cookie has crumbled, Kehinde, she said has been calling and sending text messages begging her to come back.
“He sent me sms that he has seen a buyer for his house at Adeniyi Jones for N40million. He asked me if he should sell it and that if he does, he will buy me a new car and a rent me a new apartment. Why now? I don’t need all that, I want my sanity.” After she ignored him, he sent her another text abusing her and calling her names. “So you can see that he does not mean well for me,” she re-iterated.
E24-7 checks revealed as at Saturday evening Kehinde was combing the nooks and crannies of Ikorodu to locate Funke’s dad’s house. He boasted: “I will do anything to win my wife back.”
Over the past few months, Funke and Kehinde had started to see things differently so the need to pull out became inexorably high. It was revealed exclusively to E24-7 MAGAZINE by sources close to Funke, that she was ready to go on with Kehinde’s warts and all but for the fact that loyalty has never been his strong point- his children from different women tell it all. Kehinde, our source hinted, has a roving eye when it comes to the opposite sex and this often causes friction between him and his celebrity wife. There are tales about his dalliance with his Personal Assistant, Funke. Observers of the marriage from inception feel that when fame and money come to a meeting point in a relationship, it will result in problems if the couple are not committed and disciplined. Moreover, a byproduct of this alliance is usually ego and it kills celebrity marriages faster than one can open the pages of tabloids and magazines. But this is not the case with Funke. “I respect him to the end but he chose to treat me that way. He said he wanted to clip my wings.”
Funke and Kehinde rarely spent substantial time together even at the peak of their marriage. Both kept to hectic schedules by virtue of their chosen professions. While Funke is often involved in back-to-back shooting on movie sets, Kehinde jumps from one construction site to another; pressing buttons for his political ambitions; and keeping dates with his wife at home and other women by the side. This sort of arrangement invariably makes keeping faith with the vows of the union very difficult. In the long run, suspicion will rear its ugly head and the couple will eventually drift apart, especially when they don’t live under the same roof. This is best exemplified in Funke and Kehinde’s break up.
Besides, Kehinde’s disturbing and haunting pasts have repeatedly stared Funke right in the face, and according to E24-7 MAGAZINE’s impeccable source, Funke learnt shockingly that her once beloved hubby was expelled from the University of Jos almost as soon as he was matriculated as a student of the ivory tower. His admission, according to our source, was faulty right from the beginning and since that first attempt at tertiary education went awry, he shut his door at education. When he returned from Jos, he found strength in his entrepreneurial skill coupled with the influence and support of his mother, a market leader and successful businesswoman; he became an estate developer, building chains of shops in Oshodi market.
Gradually, he crept into politics and his popularity soared that he became a well-known grassroots politician and a great mobilizer. More than twice, Kehinde, who belonged to the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), and his supporters have clashed with the NATIONAL UNION OF ROAD TRANSPORT WORKERS (NURTW) Treasurer, Musiliu Akinsanya aka MC Oluomo an Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) loyalist. Kehinde has also contested for elective posts twice; most recent, was the Oshodi/Isolo Constituency 1 House of Representatives in 2007 which he also lost.
Many years after, he reawakened his political ambition and quickly re-aligned himself by joining the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN). To shore up his image, he found in Funke who has become monstrously popular with her movie, Jenifa and the sequel, The Return of Jenifa, a ready tool. He convinced the favourite actress to lead him to the Leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, whom he had assaulted many years ago during the market women leadership tussle between his mother, Alhaja Almaroof and the late Iyaloja General Alhaja Abibat Mogaji. After he atoned for his ‘sins,’ he joined the train of well- wishers that went to London to felicitate with the former governor when one of his sons graduated from a university in London. Reliable sources told E24-7 MAGAZINE that Kehinde’s lost bid to win the contract to rebuild Oshodi market really threw him off balance and that probably made him to turn the heat on his latest wife, Funke who wanted his attention.
Despite the ill-fated turn that the relationship has taken, many of Funke’s fans can’t help but wonder if she hadn’t known that the union was doomed to fail from the onset. The reason for this thinking is not far-fetched; firstly, Funke opted for the Muslim marriage even when many thought that she would go to the court registry to cement her marriage with Oloyede. Secondly, sources close to the family said Kehinde was warned by spiritualists not to venture into the marriage but he declined and did not share it with Funke. In the same vein, Funke was told not to go into it by her parents but she asked them to respect her wish.
And as it plays out, she is free to remarry anytime she pleases without unnecessary legal impediments. This and many other factors contribute to the opinion shared by many of her fans that the delectable thespian knew that the future of her marriage with Oloyede will not be as long, colourful and bright as it appeared with all the glam. It’s just too quick and too fast to break. Now that the requiem mass has been sung for the once celebrated union, one cannot but remember the view of controversial actress, Tonto Dikeh, who declared that Nollywood brides often marry “horribly.” Sources close to Funke, who has returned to Asaba’s movie location on Saturday morning, believe that though her action may not make perfect sense to many now as the confusion created may be laughed at while she goes through the tears, she’s confident that she will smile again.